Art Exhibits

Under the Canopy by Rosalind Welsh

Saturday, May 1- Wednesday, July 14
Kitchen Garden Café

Rosalind Welsh’s recent body of work, UNDER THE CANOPY was inspired by her walks in the woods with Ginger, her Russell terrier, discovering new forms and configurations in the barks and branches of the Maine forest.

Her canvases are created in a unique way that began in art school and then developed over the years. In school, she would collect canvas scraps from an older artist to use in class. When she ran out of usable pieces, she put together smaller ones, creating shapes and forms to paint on. Now, she starts with a line drawing, making a pattern to use to cut shapes from the canvas. These are sewn together and hand-stretched over a frame; like traditional canvases, she primes and paints.

Though she finds satisfaction working in both the sculpted and flat canvases, Roz says that the initial line drawing is crucial to the success of the painting. “If the lines are right, the shadows and color will follow.”

Roz attended the School of Visual Arts in New York City where she studied in the fine art department (1975-1978). She exhibited her paintings, sculptures, and installations in many New York and New Jersey venues such as 5th St. Gallery, The Cat Club, Kamikaze Club, and City Without Walls, until she moved back to her hometown of Damariscotta, Maine, in 1986.

Roz has exhibited with Art Collector Maine in Kennebunkport and Rockland; Sagegrass Gallery, Bar Harbor; Ego Home showroom, Portland; S.O.F. Gallery, Bath; Jen Burral’s Gallery, Portland; River Arts Gallery, Damariscotta; and Cornerstone Gallery in Southwest Harbor, Maine. Rosalind lives and works year-round in Damariscotta.

Into The Woods by Hélène Farrar

Saturday, May 1-Tuesday, July 13
The Market

For as long as artist Hélène Farrar can remember, walking outside in the woods has been both her self-care practice and meditation. During this past year, she says, “walking the wooded trails behind our house has brought me great solace. I am often accompanied by my senior dog who likes to take his time, forcing me to slow down—an opportunity to observe both big and minute changes in the landscape.”

Hélène has found that slowing down, focusing her attention on the natural world and her breath, has been a gift. “I am delighted to share these works with you and hope they can bring you, too, the quiet intention needed in this increasingly busy world we live in.”

Her paintings are created in the ancient medium of encaustic. Encaustic, from the Greek word “enkaustico,” meaning “to burn in,” is a natural beeswax-based medium that is painted on while molten hot. Every layer of wax is connected via heat to the subsequent layer. She often use a butane torch and heat gun for this part of the process. When the wax is cool, Hélène spends a lot of time scraping and scratching back into the surface using various wax carving tools, both traditional and alternative. Wax below the surface is revealed and lines are formed by dropping in additional layers of pigment.

Wood Werx by Kevin James

Wednesday, July 14- Sunday, October 17
The Market

Artist Kevin James hails from Bangor, Maine, and says, “My artistic intent is to take what has come before in art, add my responses to what I experience in life, and make art that goes beyond the former and reflects the latter.”

Painting is what he does most, but he has been engaged in the making of objet trouvé (found object) art and additive wood sculpture for far longer. As a boy, whenever he was without adult supervision, he raided his father’s and friends’ fathers’ garages and workshops for pulleys, saw blades, and other bits of metal, fixing them to old boards, wooden crates, and broken furniture for the sole purpose of “making things that looked cool.”

His present-day practice in this medium involves more than achieving a “cool look.” Though, he says, “I am still fond of pulleys and saw blades. The objects and materials themselves inform the process in a number of ways,” he continues. “As often as not, the concept of a work is suggested by the material.”

Objet trouvé art and wood sculpture provide Kevin with a language as expressive and nuanced as that of painting. In this language, he says, “I can render a scene, make visual puns or rage at the machine.”

Kevin lives on North Pond in Smithfield, Maine with his covivant, Pat Burdick.

Beyond Function by Eben Blaney

Wednesday, July 14- Sunday, October 17
Kitchen Garden Café

Eben Blaney’s sculptural work grew naturally out of the furniture he builds. Serving as both a compliment to his more spare furniture designs and as an outlet for some of the accumulated ideas that haven’t found their way into his furniture, the sculptures provide an outlet for expression and experimentation, free from furniture’s functional restraints. Recently, this took the form of his first series of ebonized (blackened) wall sculptures created in the early days of the pandemic. Since then, his sculptural work has continued to reveal itself in a variety of abstract forms.

Eben grew up locally on the Boothbay Harbor waterfront and still draws consciously (and unconsciously) from the shapes and compositions of the in-progress boat hulls he watched his father build there, and also from his mother’s many artistic endeavors. He has recently come to understand the influence that the many African artifacts and art objects that his grandfather brought back from teaching in Kenya have had on both his furniture and sculpture.

After several years spent working in various wood shops on the West Coast and then back in Portland, Maine, Eben returned to the MidCoast in the early 2000s and built his present studio and showroom in Edgecomb, where he now adds sculpture to the furniture and decor pieces that he creates speculatively and by commission.

Cherished Capsules by Kate Mc Gillivary

Wednesday, July 14- Sunday, October 17
The Market

For Kate, capturing flower blossoms and their seed capsules is a lifelong passion. Think of the joy, the wonder, and the power of a simple flower blossom, and then the seed capsules that proceed the blossom. Ralph Waldo Emerson said it best, “The creation of a thousand forests is in one acorn.”

Kate discovered colored pencils while studying at the Denver Botanical Garden School of Botanical Art and Illustration where she graduated with a certificate of completion. Every winter, Kate looks forward to sitting down at her drawing table to focus on depicting many of the plants she nurtures during the landscaping season or (better yet) discovers while traveling. Kate’s chosen medium of colored pencils fulfills her desire to capture the wonderful, fine details of plants, layer upon layer, making it seem as if the painting’s observer could pluck the subject right off the paper.